


exist for love

by khirimochi (NekoAisu)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Introspection, Love, Love Languages, M/M, Named Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Non-Human Original Character(s), Specific Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-28
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:27:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24416602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NekoAisu/pseuds/khirimochi
Summary: Noah'li is one of Non's OCs! I love him v much and am grateful for the opportunity to write something with him!!I know I cannot heal the hurt/But I will hold you here forever/If I can
Relationships: G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Original Character(s), G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light
Kudos: 15





	exist for love

**Author's Note:**

> Noah'li is one of Non's OCs! I love him v much and am grateful for the opportunity to write something with him!!
> 
> [I know I cannot heal the hurt/But I will hold you here forever/If I can](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YDkrJaiCrw)

There are many things Noah’li takes care not to think about. The world is not a kind place. It holds no love for him and his displaced existence. But there is also the Exarch─or, as Noah’li knows him, G’raha Tia─who welcomes him back with a smile. The same man who reached between realms to tear apart time and bring forth a better future. 

He likes to think about him. 

There is the sound of his laugh, how he has terrible posture (and always has, though now he blames it on being rather old for those of his kin), and how he will ramble about Allagan this and soul-containment that like he did during their days exploring the Crystal Tower. He speaks of things just to get the thoughts out of his head and always seems surprised when there are tomes placed on his desk or tonics shoved into his hands during late nights. 

It’s a collection of things that make Noah’li love him. 

And when had it become love? What a strange thing to call these feelings of his, truly, but the lightness to his chest is hard to mistake for aught else. There is a fluttering there that suggests that maybe (impossibly) he may be able to take flight with it. To be able to name the feeling is nearly like a rush of power, of surety, and Noah’li smiles to himself. 

What a man G’raha is to make him feel this way. 

They are a matched pair, the two of them. The keeper of Allag’s greatest legacy and an automaton made to be a weapon of that selfsame empire. They fit together, hand in hand. 

When they sit together, it is comfortable even if they are on opposite sides of the room. Noah’li knows that G’raha is comforted by his presence just as he is by the Seeker’s rambling. They compliment each other, even if those perfectly complementary aspects sometimes end up with them at odds. 

“I love you,” Noah’li is sometimes tempted to say. He doesn’t. The sentence sits on his tongue like an aftertaste, the last bit of carbonization from one of those bubbly drinks Lyna is so fond of. It dissipates with the same fizzy feeling of not quite having his heart under control. 

G’raha says it for him. He whispers it, sings it, shouts it, puts it in everything he does from sleeping leaned against Noah’li’s shoulder to standing at his back when facing down an enemy. He is full of it. Made of it. There is affection overflowing from his fingertips when he traces patterns against Noah’li’s palm. It seeps into his skin and makes his circuits jitter not unlike mortal nerves. 

Sometimes, Noah’li thinks that maybe it would have been nice to be made to love. He wonders if maybe he would have more space to hold all that he feels, if he had been. G’raha is like an explosion of sensation from tip to toe. When his hand slots perfectly against Noah’li’s it’s… perfect. Terrifying. So wonderful it feels like all the moments before were eons spent being forbidden from loving. He wishes he could have that feeling more often (and he tries to have it) but they are torn apart with this quest and that mystery until collapsing together inside the Ocular. 

Maybe it is good he wasn’t made for loving, though. It makes it that much more powerful that he can feel as he does. He can choose to love, to exist for it and strive for it, and pour his heart out into casual touches and the smiles they grant him. 

_ I love you,  _ he says with a hand on G’raha’s hip.  _ I adore you,  _ he reminds when he sees G’raha’s eyes avoiding the sprawl of crystal across his shoulders. 

_ (Don’t go,  _ he fails to scream. There is Light flooding his soul and shredding that which is truly his.  _ Please, don’t go. I love you.) _

They tell each other whenever they can, though rarely in words. The times where their hearts are overfull it’s nearly tangible. G’raha had said, once, that if he could provide shelter within the Tower for all, he would without hesitation. To Noah’li it had nearly sounded like he would open his arms to all, to turn his body into a shelter where he cradled the world’s woes until they ceased their endless crying. That he was someone made to comfort others was not a thing either of them would have said during their days exploring. The scholar from back then feels nearly like a separate person (and maybe in certain ways, they are) that Noah’li can no longer reach. 

But maybe that isn’t all that bad. The G’raha before him is beautiful, wonderful, a collection of scars and pockmarked crystal, and so utterly irreplaceable that Noah’li knows the shape of his body like it’s a well-worn map. Everything wonderful and terrible seems to lead back to him. 

When Noah’li returns, G’raha is always there. He opens his arms, smiles, and there is the unspoken whisper that can never be quieted. 

_ I love you.  _

**Author's Note:**

> hmu on:  
> Twitter [@khirimochi](https://twitter.com/khirimochi) OR [@TheHolyBody (NSFW)](https://twitter.com/TheHolyBody)  
> Tunglr @[Main](https://kiriami.tumblr.com) OR @[FFXIV Imagines](https://ffxivimagines.tumblr.com)


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